ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Ten Kurdish migrants held hostage in Libya are being held by armed groups rather than state authorities, an Iraqi lawmaker said on Friday, citing communications from Libyan security services.
“There is no official evidence confirming the presence of Iraqi detainees in official prisons,” Muthanna Amin, a Kurdish member of the Iraqi parliament’s foreign relations committee, told Rudaw’s Malik Mohammed, noting that “Libyan security agencies have informed the Iraqi embassy that there are no Iraqi prisoners in those facilities.”
“The Iraqi embassy maintains that these sites are not under the authority of the Libyan state, but are controlled by armed groups,” Amin added, noting that “legally and diplomatically, Iraqi diplomats cannot engage with armed groups and must deal strictly through the government.”
The case emerged days after 33 young Kurdish migrants detained in Libya were repatriated to the Kurdistan Region.
A video circulating online shows 10 young men being held captive, with an Arabic-speaking narrator identifying them as Kurds.
Families of some of the captives told Rudaw that an individual operating under the name “Abu Ali” is demanding a ransom of $4,000 per person for their release.
The 10 youths, aged between 18 and 25, are from Hajiawa and Chwarqurna in Sulaimani province’s Raparin administration. They left the Kurdistan Region 45 days ago, hoping to cross the Mediterranean Sea from Libya to reach Europe.
Relatives, speaking on condition of anonymity, said they had already paid smugglers in full to secure safe passage to Europe but were later contacted by captors demanding additional payments as the smuggler negotiated their handover for cash.
The families believe the youths are being held at informal detention sites, including Rahba, Bir al-Ghanam and Hufra.
Amin said a young man from Dukan managed to contact his family from Bir al-Ghanam and confirm that he was being held there, but the exact location and condition of the 10 captives believed to be in Hufra or Rahba remain unconfirmed.
Amin also expressed grave concern for six other young men from Sulaimani's Ranya and Pshdar who disappeared in Libya more than three months ago.
“It is unlikely that those young men are still alive,” he said, noting that “their boat sank in the Mediterranean Sea, and they drowned.”
Osman Mustafa, head of the local migration and crisis response directorate, told Rudaw on Friday that officials were coordinating with international agencies and Iraq’s interior ministry to address the situation and assist missing migrants.
Driven by unemployment, economic hardship and the search for better opportunities, young people from the Kurdistan Region continue to undertake dangerous journeys to Europe through Libya and across the Mediterranean.
According to the Directorate of Migration, Displaced, and Crisis Response in the Raparin administration, more than 500 migrants have been repatriated from Libya to the Kurdistan Region since 2015, the majority of them from Raparin.
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